An Unexpected Hero
by Shadow-Wolf0020
Summary: A newly resurrected Guardian, with the last moments of his life still fresh in his mind, must now traverse a new and deadly world on the brink of destruction. Can he prove he has the will and determination to survive or will he become another casualty of war?
1. Chapter 1

It was another beautiful day in Russia for the Kanson family, as they had finally been able to take a vacation from the chaos of everyday life. Yes, life was good for Jaiden, his wife Marissa, and their ten year-old daughter Emily. "Daddy, are we going to be at the city soon, I'm getting hungry," Emily said, while rubbing her belly. "We will be there in a couple of hours, honey," Jaiden replied, "Then we can eat wherever you want to."

"I'm glad we got to take this vacation, dear. Finally a chance to relax and not care about anything else besides fun," Marissa said throwing a mischievous wink towards Jaiden. He laughed, "Definitely, and I'm going to have to follow up on that later," as he leaned over and kissed her and hearing a disgusted "eww" from his daughter. They both laughed at the look on her face and Marissa piped in, "One day you are going to want to kiss a boy too, right sweetie," looking at her husband as she said that. "Oh no, not on my…"

_Guardian_

Jaiden stopped speaking and looked around.

"Honey, what's wrong?"

"Did you hear that?"

"Hear what?" Marissa asked looking concerned. "It sounded like somebody was speaking to me and…wait, why are the cars stopping?"

They looked ahead on the highway and saw all of the cars coming to a halt, with some people stepping out of the vehicles. Jaiden pulled the car to a stop, "What's going on?" "I don't know Jaiden, maybe we should as someone." Emily started sniffling, "What's happening?" Marissa turned back to their daughter, "Everything's okay sweetie, maybe there is roadwork ahead and everyone has to stop."

Jaiden stepped out and moved to see what was happening, and that's when he saw what everyone was looking at: in the sky were many ships moving towards them. _Where did they come from?_

As he looked on, he saw something under the ships glow purple and only then did he realize what they were: cannons. "Get out of the car! Hurry!" he yelled. "Daddy, what's happening?" Emily was in tears now.

_Guardian…_

He looked back up at the ships and saw a large blast of energy speeding towards his family. Cars ahead of him were being engulfed in black and purple energy followed by a cascade of explosions. Jaiden tried opening the backseat door, but the child safety locks were engaged. He looked back and the energy pulse was nearly upon them, "Marissa, Emily, listen to me: I lo…." An explosion engulfed them and everything went black.

…_eyes up Guardian._

Then Jaiden saw a blinding light…


	2. A Guardian Rises part 1

Jaiden slowly opened his eyes, the glare of the bright afternoon sun momentarily blinding him. He sat up but was suddenly overwhelmed with dizziness, and after a few moments, the feeling passed. "It worked! You're alive!" a voice said in front of him. Jaiden looked up and saw a very weird…machine thing; a robot maybe? Jaiden rubbed his forehead, only to finding his hand meeting a helmet. He looked around and saw the devastation around him: He was on a highway, that much he was certain of, filled with cars, or remains of cars, all rusted with age; but many others were destroyed, like the group of vehicles around him. An image flashed through his mind: a brilliant flash of purple energy, a burning sensation, screams, and then it was suddenly gone. _What the hell was that?_ "What happened here? Where am I? What are you?" He asked the machine while standing, and suddenly noticing that he is no longer wearing his shirt and pants, "And what the hell am I wearing?"

The machine looked at him, "We don't have a lot of time, but to answer your question of what I am: I'm a Ghost, well now I'm your Ghost. You're also wearing armor." Jaiden was now even more confused, "Why am I wearing armor?" The Ghost was about to answer when they both heard a multitude of roars echoing onto the highway. "That." The Ghost replied. "You've been dead a long time, so you're going to see a lot of things you won't understand." "Dead!? Then how did-"Another vision flashed through his mind; no not a vision, a memory: He, Marissa, and Emily on a family vacation, the roadblock of vehicles, strange ships in the sky, the purple pulse of energy flying towards them, his skin melting, then blackness. Jaiden quickly pulled of his helmet and vomited. _My family is dead!? Why am I alive!?_ He started breathing heavily and panic started rising in his chest. He heard the roars echo around them again but didn't notice, "Guardian, we don't have much more time. We have to leave and head for the Wall", even the Ghost was beginning to panic now. "Guardian!" Jaiden was going deeper into shock, at least he was when he suddenly felt something collide with his helmet; hard. Jaiden let out an 'oomph' and grabbed his head and looked over at the Ghost, "C-can you bring my family back?" Desperation laced his voice and was obviously holding back tears. "I'm sorry," the Ghost replied, but I can only bring back those who were given the Traveler's Light. Now please, we have to go before you get killed again." Jaiden laughed bitterly to himself, '_What if I don't care about dying again?'_

Regardless, he pulled himself up and started moving when a blue pulse whizzed by his ass, right where his head just was, feeling his hair, all of it, stand on end. "SHIT!" he yelled while jumping forward. The Ghost moved further ahead, "We need to go this way, quickly!" Jaiden started sprinting towards the Ghost, and right when he got near him, the Ghost disappeared. "Wait, where did you go!?" Then he heard the Ghost's voice in his helmet, "Don't worry, I'm still with you. Just keep running towards the Wall, and get inside." Jaiden was not the most athletic person in his family, his wife could attest to that when she took him jogging and he couldn't keep up, but now he was running like he had done it all his life. Admittedly, whatever the reason for this new found athleticism, was now proving very beneficial now as he was running like his ass was on fire; which it very well could have been from that near miss. Shots continued flying by him as he got nearer to the wall, and he finally spotted a doorway in the side of the wall. He very nearly made it inside when whatever was shooting at him finally found its mark and he face planted right into the dirt when his right leg buckled. A wave of pain shot up through his leg, leaving Jaiden gasping for breath. "Just a few more feet, you can do this" the Ghost encouraged. Jaiden pushed himself to his feet and limped over to the doorway before hurling himself inside and slamming the door shut. It was darker in here but there were still a few lights on to allow him to see, thankfully, as he had a staircase to go up. Jaiden checked his leg; there was a large scorch along the back of his leg and it was still throbbing. _What am I going to do?_ Jaiden mused; _I don't even know how to fight_. The Ghost spoke up, "Well, that was the easy part. Now for the hard part; I hope you're ready for this." Jaiden could only bang his head on the wall in frustration.


	3. A Guardian Rises Part 2

Jaiden scanned his immediate area as he sat against the wall nursing his wounded leg: it was darker in here and a set of stairs in front of him but not much else. "We need to find you a weapon to fight off any Fallen we encounter," his Ghost piped up. Sighing, Jaiden rose to his feet, taking care not to put too much weight on his bad leg. "Is there even going to be anything in here, this place is a dump and rusted all over. I mean what are the odds of finding a functional weapon in this place?" he asked. "Glad to see you're so optimistic, just the attitude we need to get you out of here alive," the Ghost snarked back. Chuckling to himself, Jaiden ascended the stairs soon coming upon a better lit room from windows. A little further ahead, just pass the windows, was a darkened area where the light did not reach, "You wouldn't happen to be able to light the way, would you Ghost?" The Ghost appeared next to him and shined a light on the path ahead, "That should help." "Thanks, now where are we going again?" "We're heading to the old Cosmodrome to find you a ship so we can get back to the City." Jaiden nodded, "So what's this…" A sudden noise from ahead made him jump and the Ghost turn its light off. The banging sound continued and it sounded like something crawling around which proved true when the banging tapered off. The Ghost's light came back on, "We're going to have to be extra careful now, there's probably Fallen all in these ruins." Jaiden sighed, "I think I preferred my desk job…; all right, let's get out of here."

Jaiden stepped out onto a large platform area and he could tell that the area he is in is huge, seeing nothing but the light of his Ghost and an orange glow up to his right from a safety light. The Ghost pulled itself apart into multiple pieces with a bright blue glowing center and moved away from him, "Hang tight, Fallen thrive in the dark, we won't. I'll see what I can do." The Ghost continued forward and Jaiden saw the rest of the platform, which was more like a balcony, and an area that has been gated off. The Ghost spoke up again, "Another one of these hardened military systems and a few centuries of entropy working against me." The Ghost disappeared behind some pipes and Jaiden began hearing noises in the dark, like multiple creatures moving about. CHING! Off in the distance lights began flashing on and getting closer; that's when he saw what were making those sounds: there were a multitude of humanoid creatures, some with four arms and many others with two, and floating robots. The scariest part of all this was that they were all looking at him. Jaiden heard the gate behind him rolling up, which is good, because the Fallen opened fire, which is bad. The Ghost was now flying back to Jaiden who was limping furiously to the newly opened exit, several shots narrowly missing him. They both got through the gate and saw a lone rifle leaning up against a crate, "What are the odds?" Jaiden asked again as he picked it up. Jaiden wasn't a gun enthusiast; oh sure he's played first-person shooters so he knows a few things like there was a holographic reticule instead of iron sights that were not functioning. _Like I thought an ancient gun that doesn't work_, Jaiden mused. "I hope you know how to use that," the Ghost said. "No, I don't. I do know that the reticule is not working." The Ghost scanned over it, "Try it now, I gave it some power". Jaiden looked back through it and sure enough the reticule was working fine now. Jaiden pulled out the magazine to check if there were bullets and, to his surprise, a full magazine of ammo. The biggest question now is whether he could fire it and, if so, do it without blowing the gun up. "You ready to go?" the Ghost asked. "No, but I have little choice, don't I?" Jaiden sighed again and prepared to move (see limp) forward.

Jaiden continued forward, moving around a corner and saw one of the Fallen running around another corner ahead. "Careful, and watch your tracker," the Ghost said. Jaiden looked confused, "My what?" "In the top left of your helmet, do you see that circle, that's your tracker." Jaiden slowly crept along the wall, getting closer to the corner where the Fallen ran off to. He peeked around the corner and saw nothing, "I know this is cliché, but I have a really bad feeling about this." "That makes two of us". Jaiden continued along, gun at the ready, "If we're lucky maybe we can sneak pass them". No sooner when he said those words did one Fallen pop out of a small cubby and another dropped in front of him. Jaiden quickly stepped backwards, his injured leg giving out and tripping on his own two feet, "OH SHHIII-AAARGH!" As he fell, he gripped the trigger and the rifle sprayed lead everywhere in front of him, with more than half of his bullets missing with the rest finding their mark on one of the Fallen. He opened his eyes to see one fallen lying dead in a pool of its blood and an exit wound on the back of its head. The other Fallen was staring as well, surprised at the _sheer absurdity _of somehow not getting hit in that hail of bullets and the human's inability to use a simple weapon. CLICK! Jaiden and the Fallen looked at each other as he realized the dawning horror of having no ammo left. The Fallen took the opportunity to leap upon him and strike at him with its shock rod but Jaiden caught the Fallen's arm as it descended and they started grappling. Jaiden was amazed that he was able to match the strength of the creature as they struggled. The Fallen happened to lean on his injured leg which caused him to gasp in pain at which point the Fallen laughed and exploited this newly discovered vulnerability. The tide of the battle shifted as Jaiden was now being distracted by the pain in his leg, the electrified rod getting ever closer. In an act of desperation, Jaiden freed his other hand and threw a wild punch at its face, but as he did so his fist was engulfed in fire, and landed a direct hit. The Fallen got knocked off of him and was howling in pain as fire engulfed its body and eventually collapsed. Jaiden was breathing hard, attempting to catch his breath, "I'm glad you're okay," his Ghost said. "You really don't know how to fight do you?" "No, I was only an office worker before I died. This was my first fight I've ever had." Jaiden groaned in pain as he stood back up, "Is this is what my new life is to be like: A never ending battle against these things?" "Yes, against them and others who threaten the Last City, it's not ideal, but Guardians are the only ones who can stop this."So what made you pick me?" Jaiden asked. The Ghost looked pensive for a moment, "You are one of the few who can wield the Light, and the potential to make a difference." "I have one more question before we move on: what the hell did I just do?! I set that thing on fire!" "You're a Warlock," it said simply. "A Sunsinger Warlock to be precise but I can explain later, we still have more Fallen to go through."

Thirty minutes later, after a bunch of fighting, running (limping), and pissing one's pants (figuratively, thankfully, but almost literally), Jaiden and his Ghost finally reached outside once more. It was nighttime and Jaiden looked to the sky, the fresh air hitting his face as he looked at a beautiful green aurora. "Wow" was all he could say. His Ghost spoke to him, "Well, we're here, at the Cosmodrome and we're almost to a hangar with a ship waiting inside. Are you ready?" Jaiden looked around once more, "Let's get this done."


End file.
